feminist news round-up 15.05.16

First ever Indigenous woman to contest Miss World Australia
For the first time ever, an Indigenous woman will be contesting the Miss World Australia competition. Maminydjama ‘Magnolia’Maymuruis a 19-year-old Yolgnu woman and will be representing the Northern Territory. She says she’s come out of her shell to compete in the competition ‘for all the young kids’, to show that anything is possible if you work hard.

NSW to potentially decriminalise abortion
This year, the New South Wales State Parliament will vote on two bills regarding the decriminalisation of abortion and the creation of safety zones around abortion clinics. The bills have been introduced by Greens MP Mehreen Faruqi. Anne Summers questions why MPs feel the need to impose their personal views in Parliament, particularly when most of the population concede at the very least that abortion should be lawful in some cases.

Funding cuts for Australia’s arts community
This week, the Australia Council, which allocates government funding to arts and cultural organisations, announced their funding shake-up for 2017 onwards. Unfortunately, 62 organisations which rely on this funding have been cut, including Express Media and the Mosman Art Gallery. The Confederation of Australian State Theatre Companies said that the cuts will cause ‘irreparable damage across the sector’, which will threaten to close organisations and entail job losses.

Stop using rape as a plot device – Jodie Foster
Director and Oscar-winning actress Jodie Foster has spoken out at Cannes against male filmmakers gratuitously using sexual violence as a method of female character development. She described the trend as ‘ridiculous’ and said that it displayed a lack of effort by men to put themselves in the shoes of women as characters.

Australian Paralympic team taking strides in gender equality
There will be 172 Australian athletes heading to the Paralympic Games in Rio this September, and half of them will be women. SBS Zela has spoken to Kate McLoughlin, the Australian Paralympic Chef de Mission, and co-captain of the team and tennis player Daniela Di Toro, on their experiences of being women in sport, as well as mentioned some of our women to keep an eye out for during the games. An important read for any sports fan!